Words that confused you as a child

[Terxpahseyton]

Gulf War

I didn't understand what a war had to do with playing golf. Did they go to war over a golf game?

(edit: in German gulf and golf are spelled and pronounced identically)

 

[timtofly]

elimino -wait, that was the letters l, m, n, o.

 

[Angst]

This is perhaps not relevant to the thread, but I never really knew what communism was about even though I knew USSR used to do it and used to be evil according to my dad. I thought it had to do with the kommuner (the local city governments, basically) - but my dad explained to me that communism was about the idea that everyone should be paid equally. Which I didn't get because it sounded kinda fair and good. How could that be a bad thing?

 

[Antilogic]

masticate

It sounded like a dirty word.

 

[Gori the Grey]

I knew e-pit-o-me in speech and ep-i-tome in writing. I knew that both of them meant the highest of something. I didn't know they were the same word.

 

[Archbob]

Silent letters. If I ruled the world, silent letters would be illegal because words should sound like how they spell.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Although here it was the silent letters in other words that caused my error. In epitome the final e is sounded.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Silent letters. If I ruled the world, silent letters would be illegal because words should sound like how they spell.

Yes I agree that the world should speak German.

 

[metatron]

Yes I agree that the world should speak German.

Isn't this just a matter of taste?
We all speak French. The Anglosphere people choose to do horrible things to their french words when they speak and we do it when we write. Big whoop.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

After the world has to speak German we shall cleanse the German language from words with foreign origin and its dirty sublingual heritage.

 

[metatron]

After the world has to speak German we shall cleanse the German language from words with foreign origin and its dirty sublingual heritage.

My case in point would have been "Büro".

You want to say "Schreibstube" instead?
Really?

 

[Archbob]

Screw this, I'll force everyone to talk in Binary.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I used to think that the weak and strong forms of the word "the" were separated words, or else that the unstressed form was an informal abbreviation. I couldn't figure out how to spell the unstressed form with fewer letters though, and was embarrassed when I asked how to spell the word and was told that it was t-h-e, as I had long known was how the pressed form was spelled.


Can't we all just switch to Latin?

 

[Joecoolyo]

Gulf War

I didn't understand what a war had to do with playing golf. Did they go to war over a golf game?

(edit: in German gulf and golf are spelled and pronounced identically)

In the same vein, the Cold War was quite a frigid conflict in my young mind.

 

[Leonel]

I remember getting the concepts of minutes and hours mixed up.

 

[classical_hero]

Oral sex. I thought it meant talking about sex when I was younger.

 

[Antilogic]

This is perhaps not relevant to the thread, but I never really knew what communism was about even though I knew USSR used to do it and used to be evil according to my dad. I thought it had to do with the kommuner (the local city governments, basically) - but my dad explained to me that communism was about the idea that everyone should be paid equally. Which I didn't get because it sounded kinda fair and good. How could that be a bad thing?

It's only looking back at these conversations we realize our parents were just winging it and making stuff up on the fly to avoid another why question.

In the same vein, the Cold War was quite a frigid conflict in my young mind.

I remember not having a firm grasp on the concepts of war and death until my best friend fell out of a tree and broke his neck.

Oral sex. I thought it meant talking about sex when I was younger.

Those conversations must have been awkward for the parents...

 

[Borachio]

Writing "Beginning"

I just didn't know when to stop. "Begininining".

And for some reason I used to spell "perhaps" "prehaps".

 

[Darkflight]

Gorilla warfare is the one classic that comes to mind.

 

[The_J]

Good one, had that too .

I still have to remind myself, that pilates is NOT something to eat. But that probably doesn't come from my childhood.

There's also a German word, which confused me like hell, and which can't be literally translated..."übervorteilen". Means taking advantage of someone, but literally it would be "over-advantaging" or something like that. Sounded always like the opposite to me.